Hang a star on Keith Olbermann's Jerry Coleman tribute

In the wake of yet another magical sports moment, Monday night's college football championship game, ESPN's Keith Olbermann reminded viewers what's really important in life, memorializing Padres broadcaster Jerry Coleman in words more beautiful than any game.

"Jerry Coleman would not let you call him a hero, and he would not let you call him a role model," Olbermann's tribute began.

'Jerry Coleman would not let you call him a hero.'

The memorial message, which is being shared widely on social media, ranged from awe over Coleman's military accomplishments to the anger Olbermann felt over people's focus this week on Coleman's malapropisms — "I'll probably make 120 mistakes this year and I have a script." — to the adulation Olbermann expressed to Coleman when they met in 2005.

Olbermann said he first heard Coleman's "marvelous laugh" when he told the man he'd been one of his earliest broadcasting role models.

"Role models? I see you found better role models later on," Olbermann recalled Coleman saying.

"Actually, I didn't," Olbermann told his audience softly as his voice began to crack.

"I wish he were here to yell at me for saying this, but he was a role model, and he was a hero."

Appreciative comments quickly piled up on Olbermann's YouTube page, where viewers called his tribute "beautiful" and "fantastic," and on other social media sites.

On YouTube, viewer ehscougarnews wrote: "My eyes are watery and the heart is heavy. I will always remember listening to him all throughout my childhood with a baseball glove in one hand, ball in the other, jumping around the living room mimicking the plays he just announced, and hearing his voice in my head call my great diving catches off the living room sofa. Jerry would hang a star on your tribute to him.﻿"

On Twitter, other people hung adjectives of their own like stars while sharing links to Olbermann's video. They described his words as classy, wonderful and perfect.